Dance Magic Dance

Now then kids. Proper quality dancing isn’t about looking good or being technically fine, it’s about full-blown passionate crazy-ass devoted enthusiasm. The best kind of boogie comes from a compulsion that makes you dance so manically and hysterically that you will probably eventually spontaneously combust (much like in the Buffy musical episode). You should march out confidently on to the dance-floor (unless you’re in a club and the dance-floor’s got carpet, in which case you should scream rather loudly, get the hell out of there and never come back; carpet is only acceptable in a bedroom/dance-floor context) and just, well, dance. Dance away, like a carefree dance demon, complete with swishing hair, flailing arms and facial ticks (excessive lip pouting, in my case), or whatever eager/ludicrous/beautiful movements feel appropriate.

But there is no doubt that this feeling of spontaneous dance euphoria can be heightened when you add method to your madness, particularly in the form of specific dance moves or club-based dance routines (à la Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion). Be inspired by the music! Can you hear those introductory drum beats? Why not shake your bottom in time to them? Wah-wah guitar? Try some Bollywood-esque bendy hand movements. Drum solo? Properly lose it, you can style your hair when you’re dead. And be inspired by the lyrics! Is the singer suggesting you ‘put your hands in the air’ or ‘jump’? (Actually, try and avoid this, as it’s a tired cliché, much loved by people who are too scared to let go when they dance, but have learned that such particular dance actions are socially acceptable and probably won’t get their ‘friends’ ribbing them for daring dance difference…) But don’t shy away from the ‘do-what-you-hear’ approach. Is the singer crooning about his car? Well grab that invisible steering wheel, honk that invisible horn, and then go even further by sticking on your invisible indicators, shifting your invisible gear stick and rolling down your invisible window (or, more likely these days, pressing the invisible electric button) and pretending to ACTUALLY be in your car. Oh. The. Hilarity. Be inspired by the context in which you find yourself. Do not be afraid of being inspired by true fellow rug-cutting lovers in your quest for dance fulfilment. To the untrained eye it may make look like you’re bitchily imitating a less-than-talented performer trying his best on the dance-floor in order to ridicule him, but the truth is that such ‘comedy’ dancing is the epitome of the kind of perfect dance performance we should all aspire to. The “I can’t dance in that traditionally acceptable manner, but so what, I’m going to dance anyway, suckers” attitude is a motto for us all, if an attitude can indeed be a motto, which I don’t think it can.

Anyway, all this just to introduce my new favourite thing on the internet. This man is the perfect prime example of true and pure dancing joy. It oh so literally does not get any better than this.

http://dailydancer.com

Cx

Just frown and go...

So, Paris being the city of romance and all that rubbish (and it’s true that it’s difficult to cross the Seine without having to march past slobbering, snoggering couples every five metres), you might naively think that young lusty Parisian men have a perfectly honed seduction technique. Well, maybe they do, but not in the Paris I seem to live in, where strange old men find it perfectly acceptable to approach young women they do not know and try their luck in the vain hope that one day, oh but one day, they might actually get more than insulted in return.

I stress, this does seem to happen ALL THE BLOODY TIME here. Just last week, in fact, a complete stranger found it perfectly acceptable to invite me to sit next to him at my own bloody picnic, before attempting to stroke my legs. GET OFF ME! But that was just a dip in the strange man ocean. It really hit its peak back in mid-March; evidently the Official Week Of Strange Men Approaching Catherine in Paris.

Firstly, a tramp approached me in Charles de Gaulle RER station, and – rather sweetly – said ‘ça va, petit rayon de soleil?’ (‘how are you, little ray of sunlight?’) and then, as an after-thought, perhaps reflecting that he had not been complementary enough, added ‘qui brille’ (‘which shines’). However, before you all start ah-ing, let’s remember that he was a smelly old drunken tramp, so I chose not to thank him and flirt back, but instead marched off to the other end of the station, frowning. He shrugged his shoulders, graciously accepting defeat and mumbling ‘c’est la vie!’.

Then, the next day, in Gare de Lyon RER station (are we sensing a pattern here?), as I was happily standing on the escalator, glad of the rest as I’d been on a two-hour walk with some friends, a random man stopped by my side and asked me if he could stand next to me on the escalator. Sorry, what? Stand next to me on the escalator?!? What, so we can jointly admire the scenic view of a 1970s underground train station, with an interior decor possibly inspired by the blue-tiled look of a swimming pool changing room? Um, now let me think… So obviously, I said ‘non’, which obviously he took to mean ‘mais oui, bien sur Monsieur’ and so he just stood there next to me, half-smiling, half-gurning at me - which, might I suggest, is not the most effective flirtation technique - and I had to frown and march off again. My oh-so-tired legs were not happy.

By the time strange man number three approached me in front of a department store, my marching away whilst frowning technique was perfectly honed, and he didn’t even have time to get past ‘bonjour Mademoiselle’. Ha!

Anyway, my all-time favourite weird man approach-tactic (with the poetic tramp a close second) remains the young man, sporting an interesting rainbow-striped hand-knitted jumper, who tried to trick me into talking to him, by shouting ‘Bonjour, bonjour’ at me in the street, in such a way that implied that we unquestionably knew each other already and just hadn’t bumped into each other for a while. For a second, he really confused me and my brain went ‘Who? What? Rainbow? Huh? Oh weirdo! Get marching! Frown!’ He gets full marks for ingenuity, though.

Voila. Come to Paris, city of love and men with no social skills.

Cx

Especially for shoe...

Little shoe anecdote. No not an anecdote about little shoes, but one about buying normal sized shoes. Size 39 to be exact.

So, I was browsing in Minelli, a semi-expensive quasi-Italian shoe store, and I chanced upon shoe that pleased me. It was black, tiny heel (the ones that look like upside-down flattened pyramids), pointy without being vicious, with a black canvasy strap across the top, near the toe, bearing the inscription Minelli, but not in an obvious way. And, bargain-ahoy, it was on sale. OK, so shoe-ahoy! Except, woe-ahoy, it wasn't my size! Curses-ahoy. (Right, enough ahoy-ing.) The same model was available in my size in fetching lime green or apricot, but, well, exactly.

But never fear, there are hundreds of other Minellis in Paris, and I should know, as I downloaded a list from the internet, deciding to trawl through them, one by one, searching for my shoe. So, armed with my list, and a plan of Paris, I worked out my itinerary, intending to get through a good four or five Minellis on my lunch break.

(At this point it might be worth appeasing your logical query as to why, rather than launching into a Minelli marathon, I didn’t just politely ask one random Minelli shop assistant in any random Minelli branch to kindly check round the other Paris Minellis to see if any of them had my shoe in stock. Well, I did ask the aforementioned random Minelli shop assistant in a random Minelli branch, and was told that such cross-referencing was malheureusement impossible… Huh!)

So, à vos marques! Prêts? Partez! Minelli Printemps, in peach, but not black, Minelli St Lazare, in lime green, but not black, unless you have pixie feet, Minelli Passage du Havre, nuffink, Minelli Lafayette, still nuffink, Minelli Boulevard Haussmann peach, lime green, but... no black.

Curses-ahoy again. Adrenaline pumping, I hovered by the metro, wondering whether I had time to make it two stops away to Minelli Grands Boulevards. Decided to do it - nothing would stop me in my quest now. (Except boredom, and having to go back to work.) Two stops later, out into the sunlight, straight into Minelli Grands Boulevards and... chorus of angels, there were my shoes! Black, 39, on sale! Hooray! I yelped with glee, picked up the left one in the display and beckoned the good shop lady to get me the right one, explaining this was my seventh Minelli and here they were.

She got them for me, I sat down to try them on, and, as I walked about in them a bit, my certainty wavered. My heels were flopping out of them a bit, though nothing an extra sole couldn't potentially fix, but the right one was a bit scratchy, and, well, I just wasn't sure anymore. Now, remember, this was my seventh Minelli in under an hour, which is devotion for a pair of shoes, especially given my less-than-enthusiastic feelings about shopping, but I've been oh so burned by summer shoes this year, as I must have bought about ten pairs of sandals in varying styles and colours, and 90% of them are blister-inducingly unwearable.

So there I was, sitting in the shop, having taken the shoes off, and pondering whether or not to get them, and the shop lady came over, and I admitted I wasn't sure, and she promptly whipped them away from me, and packed them back into their box, and took them over to her cash till. Um, ok, then.... I was still planning on looking at them questioningly a bit longer, maybe trying them on again, and pacing up and down again, but if that's how you want to play it... Plus, I was a bit late back for work by then, anyway. I went over to her desk - and at this point, let me just spitefully, and irrelevantly, say, she was a real plumpster - and asked her if she could put them by until this evening. Now this might seem like a perfectly reasonable request, but the reply was a curt, "non, they're my only 39s left, maybe if I'd had some other pairs left, and seeing as you've already been to seven Minellis..." and she moved on to help someone else. I.e., if you don't buy them right now, I don't care, because someone else will, so don't hold your breath for any favours missy, more fool you for having been to so many other Minellis.

Well, vive customer service, eh? Nice to see, such blatant commercialism at play. Anyway, I hesitated for about five more seconds before swanning off, resolutely shoeless. And that's the last bloody Minelli I ever go into. Seven Minellis, and one too many. Big fat fatty. Lose some weight, fatto.

The End.

Cx

Like, testing...

Cx